Tag Archives: unemployment

Neel Kashkari goes homeless for a week, and learns all the wrong lessons

California Republican gubernatorial candidate Neel Kashkari did a stunt spending a week homeless in Fresno looking for a job, then wrote about it in the Wall Street Journal. It turns out–shock!–that getting a job isn’t as easy as asking for one, and–double shock!–relying on our patchwork safety net doesn’t exactly deliver results or human dignity.

Kashkari supposedly spent six nights sleeping outdoors getting rousted off park benches by cops, and getting his meals from a homeless shelter during his supposedly fruitless job search. His upshot? That California is over-regulated and over-taxed, that he didn’t need government programs, that all he needed was a job, and everything would have been just fine. No, really. He wrote that.


I walked for hours and hours in search of a job, giving me a lot of time to think. Five days into my search, hungry, tired and hot, I asked myself: What would solve my problems? Food stamps? Welfare? An increased minimum wage?

No. I needed a job. Period. Like others, I have often said the best social program in the world is a good job. Even though my homeless trek was only for a week, with a defined endpoint, that statement became much more real for me. A job was the one thing that could have solved my food, housing and transportation problems.

California’s record poverty is man-made: over-regulation and over-taxation that drive jobs out of state…

Any normal person would have come away from the experience saying, “Whoa, there but for the grace of god go I.” Or perhaps “what the hell is wrong with the economy that no one will even hire me for $9/hour to sweep floors or wash dishes?” But not Republicans like Kashkari. They immediately assume that taxes and regulations must be to blame for all of it.

But Kashkari’s experience would have been far more instructive if he had actually gotten a minimum wage job. It would have been far more interesting to have seen Kashkari’s reaction to trying to find an apartment, decent food and workable transportation on $9 an hour. Methinks just “getting a job” wouldn’t have really solved his problems.

Maybe that can be his next stunt. He could even learn from Democrats who have documented their own time “living the wage” that just having a job doesn’t really cut it.

Cross-posted from Digby’s Hullabaloo

Will you fight for the unemployed?

I hope you all had a nice Thanksgiving. I am glad to be back on the campaign trail, fighting to fix our broken economy and restore the American Dream for millions of hardworking middle class families.

But while we were celebrating the holiday, Washington Republicans were busy fighting tooth and nail against an extension of unemployment benefits for over two million Americans. Click here to add your name to our petition demanding Congress extend these unemployment benefits now!

It’s just plain wrong that people cannot count on Washington to help them during tough economic times.

Sadly though, it’s what we’ve come to expect from Republicans like Congressman Jeff Denham. Congressman Denham has helped lead the charge against providing the unemployed with the benefits that will help them buy food, pay rent, and spur real economic growth by putting money back into the economy.

The important thing to remember is that these folks lost their jobs due to no fault of their own, are required to be actively searching for work, and have previously paid into the system to receive these benefits. To put it simply, they earned these benefits and there is no excuse if Congress fails to provide them.

Sign our petition telling Rep. Denham and Washington Republicans to extend these benefits now!

If we can reach 2,500 signatures, I will personally deliver the petition to Congressman Denham outside his local office. I will tell him that it’s about time he do the right thing and help the unemployed for once.

Thank you,

Jose

Why Do Politicians Want To Cut Jobs? Budget Cuts Equal Job Cuts.

We are in a painful recession.  Too often it seems like DC hears more about the concern of billionaires who don’t want to lose their tax cuts, and too little about the parent of two who works long hours and barely is getting by.  And yet Congress votes on whether the billionaire will have more, and whether the working class parent will lose his or her job.  These are the votes presently occurring, and which are being treated like a drawn out political game.

The proposed Federal budget cuts are turning into another political sideshow. The process of the budget is being treated as a chess game, a battle over politics and procedure, and one that may go on for a long time still, narrated by talking heads throughout.

If you are an American in need of a job, or one afraid that your job will be cut in the budget proposals, it isn’t just a DC soap opera.  The reverberations of the proposed cuts are drastic and personal.  States and cities throughout the country feel the impact of the cuts through the stories of those waiting with every news cycle to hear whether their job, or hope of a job, will be slashed.

The City of Los Angeles is a perfect example of this harm.  Los Angeles is already affected by the recession with a whopping 14.5% unemployment.

The proposed federal budget cuts are not abstract to Los Angeles.  They would eliminate funding for job creation projects, projects needed to help Vets find work, and they could wipe out training services for youth hoping to find skills, or the homeless, hoping to break the cycle of poverty.

In Los Angeles, the community is not sitting back and letting these proposed cuts happen without a fight.  Next Wednesday, March 23rd, Angelinos will rally at the Federal Building in Downtown Los Angeles to say no to such cuts.  Cutting jobs is not the answer to recession budgeting.  It’s time that our government prioritized working people over billionaires.  

If democracy is to work, we have to hope that Wisconsin and Los Angeles, and the other communities that have had enough, send messages strong enough to penetrate the walls of Capitol Hill.  It’s time our government support those struggling to get by, and not just those with the money to access power in private backrooms.  It’s time we make it know:  budget cuts equal job cuts.  And America simply can’t afford to cut anymore jobs.

On Saving 319,000 Jobs, Or, Legislation Keeps Teachers Teaching

WordPress › Error

There has been a critical error on this website.

Learn more about troubleshooting WordPress.